AHRC Midlands4Cities PhD funding for UK and International Applicants 2021-2022

AHRC Midlands4Cities PhD funding for UK and International Applicants 

The AHRC-funded Midlands4Cities Doctoral Training Partnership (M4C) brings together eight leading universities across the Midlands to support the professional and personal development of the next generation of arts and humanities doctoral researchers. M4C is a collaboration between the University of Birmingham, Birmingham City University, University of Warwick, Coventry University, University of Leicester, De Montfort University, Nottingham Trent University and The University of Nottingham.

Through our Open Doctoral and Collaborative Doctoral Awards Midlands4Cities will fund and support outstanding research for 109 doctoral researchers across the breadth of Arts and Humanities starting in October 2022.

There are 93 PhD studentships available through an open competition and M4C is also awarding 16 Collaborative Doctoral Awards (CDA) which provide diverse and unique project opportunities with national, regional, and local partner organisations. UK, EU, and International applicants are eligible for both routes for 2022 entry.  Further details on the funding provided are available on the M4C website.

The Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research at Birmingham City University is inviting applications from students whose research interests connect with our fields of expertise in:

Creative Industries

• Alternative and marginal economies
• Cultural entrepreneurship
• Cultural policy and media regulation
• Craft making and production practices
• Equality and diversity

Cultural Theory

• Migration and refugees
• Old and new racisms
• Populism and nationalism
• Feminist and queer politics; African feminisms, masculinities
• Postcolonial theory; imperial legacies
• Posthumanism
• Higher education institutions as sites of neoliberalisation but also resistance to it
• Social movements
  The politics of voice and listening
• The politics of time; rhythm, speed/slowness
• Practice-based research, including artistic and curatorial practice

Game Cultures

• Historical game studies
• Video game narratives and adaptation
• Posthumanism and video games
• History and (video)game communities, including fan cultures
• Video games and cultural policy
• Games and national/transnational identity

Gender and Sexuality

• Sexualised masculinity
• The histories of adult film production across Europe
• Gay men’s use of dating apps
• Digital intimacies
• Sex in cinema
• Fetish communities

History, Heritage & Archives

• Media as historical source
• Media archives and the challenges online archives pose for media historians and archivists
• Refugees, migrants, media history and archives
• Commemoration and everyday media memory
• The archive, amateur film and place

 Jazz Studies

• The cultural meaning of jazz
• Studies of jazz as a transnational practice
• Improvisation and cultural practice
• Jazz on television and radio
• Archives and documentation
• Mediation and technology
• Jazz and philosophy
• Festivals

Media & Place 

• Media and conflict
• Hyperlocal media narratives
• Media, populism and nationalism
• Community media practices and the politics of space
• Digital media and feminism
• Media, migration and displacement

Popular Music Studies

• Popular music consumption
• Songwriting
• Music scenes
• Heritage and cultural memory
• Mediation and representation
• Media and technology
• Music industries
• Material cultures
• Experimental writing

Screen Cultures 

• Marginal, subcultural and cult modes of screen production and consumer
• practices.
• The gendering of media audiences and the gendered processes of fandom.
• Film festival and distribution activities in screen research.
• Documentary filmmaking as production research perspectives.
• The history and developments of sexual culture through screen media.
• National and transnational traditions of cinema beyond Hollywood.

The deadline for AHRC funding applications is 12 January 2022 – 12.00 hours (UTC+0).  Applicants must also have applied for a place to study at one of the eight M4C universities.  For full details of eligibility, funding, research supervision areas and CDA projects, and for dates of our November application writing workshops, please visit http://www.midlands4cities.ac.uk or contact enquiries@midlands4cities.ac.uk .